Limited ingredient food for 7 month old puppy

[Julia and Gus]

Hi!

First of all, I've been a long-time reader of this forum and the wealth of knowledge has been amazing! We are first time dog owners and Doodle Kisses has saved me from a LOT of stress.

Now to my question:

Our Goldendoodle Gus is 8 months old and we have had him since he was 8 weeks. For the majority of the time we have had him, we have ended up in the vets office about every 4-5 weeks with stomach issues. Usually starts off with loose stools (pancake batter consistency) beginning in the morning and ends with him throwing up in the evening or the middle of the night. For the most part he will still eat and drink water (we withhold food if he is throwing up and then start him on a diet of boiled chicken and white rice) and typically still has energy. 

Each time we bring him in, the vet gives him metro (which after further reading, I will be asking them for a different option), fluids, DiaGel and basically tells us that he probably just ate too much grass or something/puppies in general are just super sensitive. He did have blood work about a month ago so that ruled out of lot of our more serious concerns.

This most recent time we took him in and the vet suggested that it was probably that his food is too rich for him (we feed him Orijin Large Puppy) and that we should switch to a limited ingredient, single protein food.

I basically narrowed it down to Instinct Limited Ingredient (Grain Free), Wellness Simple Limited Ingredient (Grain Free) or Natural Balance LID Puppy (Grain Free) BUT my question is - is he ok to switch to an adult food (Instinct or Wellness Simple) at 8 months or should we switch him to another puppy food (Natural Balance) and then switch him yet again to an adult food when he is older? 

We have already switched him from Hills Science Diet (breeder's food) to Orijin Puppy and then again to Orijin Large Puppy. I don't want to overdo it....

Thanks so much in advance!

[Mansi]

Hello,

My puppy Joy is now 7 months old and had similar issues when she was on Orijen Puppy. We switched her to Wellness core puppy food 2 months ago and she is doing much better now, The vomiting has completely stopped and she is also loving the taste of the kibble.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Well, there are a number of issues here.

 I can't say what may have caused the initial digestive problems, but the repeated courses of metronidazole are what is responsible for the ongoing problems. There are members here whose dogs have developed permanent gastrointestinal disease from being given repeated courses of metronidazole, particularly without subsequent probiotics.

You didn't mention probiotics. Has Gus ever taken them? 

Chicken and rice is not your best option of a bland diet...especially for a dog who has been eating a grain free diet. Many dogs don't tolerate rice very well, and rice doesn't do for dogs what it does for humans in terms of helping with diarrhea. A better choice would be chicken and sweet potatoes. In either case, the mixture must be 50/50 and you need to feed about twice as much as you would kibble. 

Unless the blood work included a GI panel, which is a special test that cannot be run in house by your vet, and must be sent out to IDEXX (takes about a week to get results), the fact that his blood work didn't show anything does not rule out serious GI disease. My last dog had Inflammatory Bowel Disease, which is about as serious as GI diseases get, and his blood work showed nothing abnormal....until a specialist had a GI panel run. 

I can pretty much guarantee you that the Orijen is not to blame for Gus's issues. However, at this point, I would agree with your vet that he may do better with a single protein LID formula.

It is perfectly FINE for Gus, and for any puppy of any age, to eat an ALS (all life stages food rather than a "puppy" formula. My own dog has never had a puppy formula in his life. Besides which, at 8 months, Gus is pretty near full grown, and can be switched to an "adult" formula without no problem. I would be recommending that he be switched to an ALS formula even if he had no issues with his GI system.

Natural Balance is not one of our recommended brands. 

My choice would be Wellness Simple. Best LID food on the market; many people here including myself have had great results with it. I highly recommend the Salmon and Potato formula.

BUT....the very first thing you need to do is to get a good probiotic. Ordinarily, I recommend Proviable, and that would be fine, but in Gus's case, I'm going to recommend that you pick up a human probiotic called VSL#3. We've talked about it here a lot. It has been extensively studied in dogs (you can tell your vet to look up Albert Jergens' studies at Iowa State vet school if he has questions) and the results for many of us have been nothing short of phenomenal. You want the capsules, not the sachets. Call around to local pharmacies to see who carries it near you. VSL#3 is sold without prescription but must be kept refrigerated, so you're better off getting it locally. (and plan to go straight home with it, lol). I found CVS had very good prices on it. 

Give Gus 2 capsules once a day. It can be given with or without food. Give him the VSL#3 for a few days before switching to the Wellness Simple, and continue giving it for at least a month. (It's sold in 60 capsules bottles, so that will last a month). 

I hope this helps. 

[Maryann,Roo and Tigger]

Go with Karen's advice.  She knows her stuff.  Most general vets are not too good on food knowledge.  Even with a so so vet, I am surprised that probiotics were never recommended with all the Metronidazole.

I would just add that you might consider changing veterinarians.  In California, single or partner owned businesses tend to be much better for a general veterinarian than corporate owned businesses.  Access - a specialty and emergency veterinarin, practice being the exception in California,they have top quality people.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Thank you, Maryann. I too was thinking a change of vet might be a good idea. :) 

[Julia and Gus]

Thank you SO MUCH! All of this info is incredibly helpful. We will switch him to 50/50 chicken and sweet potatoes instead of the rice and I just ordered the Wellness Simple (the salmon is actually the one I was looking at too!) so we will start the process of switching him over to that once he gets feeling better.

Re: probiotics - you basically read my mind. We asked the vet about Proviable when we were there and they gave us some. Did strike me as odd that we had to bring it up ourselves...

Today is his first day on them so we will see if that helps and I'll also look into VSL#3!

I've been shopping around for another vet and will definitely be looking at single/partner-owned businesses. The one we go to now is a local franchise that has been very highly recommended but I think would probably work better as a walk-in clinic vs being our main vet.

Wanted to note that although they gave him a prescription for metro again this time, we are not going to use it until they finish the fecal test (and if we do need to use it, it will be with subsequent probiotics a couple hours apart). 

Do you think we should try to schedule a GI panel or wait and see how he does with the probiotic and new food first?

Again, thanks so much for the detailed reply!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Yes, it's odd that you had to ask for the probiotic. And I bet they didn't tell you that it must be given at least two hours apart from the metronidazole (longer is better) or that it must be continued for several weeks after the metro is discontinued. 
I really, really, really would not give him metronidazole again.  It hasn't helped all this time, why would you continue to use it ???? 
In addition to causing a bacterial imbalance in the gut (hence the chronic diarrhea so many dogs end up with afterwards), it also has neurological side effects over time. Why risk that for no benefit? 
If things do not improve with the food change and the probiotics, ask the vet about Tylan. It is much safer than metronidazole and might help.

[Julia and Gus]

Yikes - definitely noted on the metro. Will not be using that at all. Scary that they would even be prescribing it just for diarrhea, yet alone so frequently, with those kind of side-effects!

I'll definitely look into the Tylan if things don't improve. Hoping the probiotic does the trick.